Richard Strozzi-Heckler

Richard Strozzi-Heckler, PhD, is an American author, psychologist, and coach recognized as a founding figure in the field of somatics. Strozzi-Heckler integrates somatics and aikido into leadership development, drawing on extensive experience in martial arts, psychology, and contemplative practice. Following service in the Marine Corps, he studied yoga and meditation in Asia before returning to the United States to earn a doctorate in clinical psychology from Saybrook University, focusing on the mind-body connection. Strozzi-Heckler began practicing aikido in the early 1970s, training under Mitsugi Saotome Shihan and Frank Doran Shihan, ultimately achieving the rank of seventh-degree black belt and receiving the title of Shihan from International Aikido Headquarters in Tokyo.

Strozzi-Heckler founded the Strozzi Institute, which is rooted in decades of research and practice at the intersection of body and mind. He co-founded the Lomi School with Robert K. Hall, Alyssa Hall, and Catherine Flaxman, integrating aikido and bodywork principles into a body-oriented psychotherapy known as Lomi Work. He later established the Aikido of Tamalpais dojo in Mill Valley, California, with George Leonard and Wendy Palmer. The Strozzi Somatics methodology he developed identifies core values and introduces practices that combine conceptual understanding with physical activity to develop behavioral traits aligned with those values, often drawing on aikido principles. Strozzi-Heckler emphasizes the body as the primary site of transformation, maintaining that sustainable behavioral change requires addressing patterns held in the musculature, organs, and nervous system.

As a speaker, coach, and consultant on embodied leadership and mastery, Strozzi-Heckler has spent more than five decades researching, developing, and teaching somatics to business leaders, executive managers, teams from Fortune 500 companies, NGOs, technology start-ups, non-profits, and the U.S. government and military. His work with the armed forces includes contributing to a U.S. Army Special Forces project that tested the integration of various practices into training programs, where he taught aikido and meditation techniques to Green Berets, an experience chronicled in "In Search of the Warrior Spirit." He also developed the prototype program for the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program and taught Navy SEALs and law enforcement. Strozzi-Heckler was featured on the cover of Wall Street Journal for his leadership program for the U.S. Marine Corps and was named among the top 50 coaches in "Profiles in Coaching."

Strozzi-Heckler is the author of nine books, including "Aikido and the New Warrior," "The Anatomy of Change," "Holding the Center," "The Leadership Dojo," "The Art of Somatic Coaching," and "Embodying the Mystery: Somatic Wisdom for Emotional, Energetic and Spiritual Awakening." These works explore how aikido informs somatic coaching and leadership development. He is the co-founder of the Mideast Aikido Project, which brings together Palestinians and Israelis through aikido, and serves as chairman of the board of the Institute for Social Advancement in Ethiopia, which introduces aikido and embodied leadership to East Africa. Strozzi-Heckler has also served as an advisor to NATO and the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe. Through teaching, writing, and global initiatives, Strozzi-Heckler demonstrates that the body is central to personal, organizational, and social transformation.